Ninja-Parents Blog

Shop Boyz: Rapper Bio Shop Boyz were an Atlanta-based rap trio consisting of Megatron (Demetrius), Romeo (Rashawn), and Nard (Bernard). They are best known for Party Like a Rockstar, a 2007 single that reached #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was inescapable on radio and in clubs for most of that summer. It was their only significant chart entry and the group has largely been inactive since. Early Life All three members were from Atlanta and began recording together in t

Lil Jon: Rapper Bio Jonathan Harold Smith — born January 17, 1971, in Atlanta, Georgia — is one of the defining sonic figures of the early 2000s. Known as Lil Jon, he invented crunk music, a maximalist Southern rap subgenre built on call-and-response hooks, thundering basslines, and relentless hype, and sold it to the entire world through a series of collaborations and productions that made his exclamations — YEAH!, OKAY!, WHAT! — universally recognisable cultural shorthand

Nicki Minaj: Rapper Bio Onika Tanya Maraj — born December 8, 1982, in Saint James, Trinidad and Tobago, and raised in Queens, New York — is the best-selling female rap artist of all time and the first woman to have a standalone #1 rap album in over a decade when Pink Friday arrived in 2010. Known as Nicki Minaj, she built her career through an extraordinary run of mixtapes in the late 2000s and has spent fifteen years as the dominant commercial female voice in hip-hop, desp

Who Is Tone Loc? Anthony Terrell Smith, known as Tone Loc, is a Los Angeles rapper who scored two of the late 1980s' biggest crossover rap singles — Wild Thing (#2 Hot 100) and Funky Cold Medina (#3) — and whose debut album Loc-ed After Dark became the first album by a Black rap musician to top the Billboard 200. Cool Hand Loc (1991) confirmed those hits were the whole story. Quick Stats Career Overview Tone Loc grew up in Los Angeles and began performing with the r

Who Is Chingy? Howard Bailey Jr., known as Chingy, is a St. Louis rapper who had two of 2003's biggest singles — Right Thurr and Holidae In — and a debut album Jackpot that went triple platinum, making him briefly the most commercially successful new rapper in mainstream pop-rap. His subsequent releases confirmed that Right Thurr was lightning in a bottle that had struck once and could not be recaptured. Quick Stats Career Overview Chingy was discovered by Ludacris'

Who Is Young MC? Marvin Young, known as Young MC, is a British-American rapper who wrote Bust a Move (1989) — one of the most enduring crossover rap singles of the late 1980s — and also co-wrote Wild Thing and Funky Cold Medina for Tone Loc. His career is defined by the gap between his extraordinary contribution as a songwriter and his modest commercial standing as a solo artist. Quick Stats Career Overview Young MC grew up in Queens, New York, and studied economics

Who Is Eminem? Marshall Bruce Mathers III, known as Eminem and Slim Shady, is a Detroit rapper widely regarded as the greatest technical MC in hip-hop history. He is the best-selling music artist of the 2000s in the US, with 220 million+ records sold worldwide and 15 Grammy Awards. His speed, wordplay, and autobiographical storytelling shaped two decades of rap lyricism. Quick Stats Career Overview Eminem grew up in working-class Detroit, battle rapping at the Hip H